Actress Jenny McCarthy has been dumped again. McCarthy won’t be in Ottawa for Bust A Move.

The Ottawa Regional Cancer Foundation reacted today to a public backlash in signing the anti-vaccine campaigner to the Ottawa breast health fundraiser.

Social media websites exploded with negative reaction to McCarthy’s choice for Ottawa’s Bust A Move celebrity.

Her replacement is Tommy Europe.

This is excellent news.

UPDATE: (2-Feb-2013) It certainly was skeptical activism from the online community, citizens and doctors that was loud enough to change their minds. However, I was disturbed by a few things. One, Jenny did not acknowledge the issue, saying instead it was a conflict with her new show. Second, the foundation seems not to have gotten the point.

“To be honest, we didn’t expect this kind of response,” said Eagen, adding she thought the choice of McCarthy was made for all the right reasons.

“We recognized that she had some incredible talent to bring to this event. She is an energized woman who can bring excitement to hundreds of people who would be working hard that day. We didn’t select her based on her personal opinions. We really focused on her celebrity fitness instructor profile and we had hoped that’s what people would find exciting about her visit to Ottawa.

“When we started to get that (negative) feedback where people were talking about anything but cancer, we just decided to move away from that.”

People were talking about science-based medicine! That has everything to do with cancer. Do they endorse alternative cancer therapies too? They did the right thing by canceling her but it’s a slippery slope from nonsense ideas about vaccinations to nonsense ideas about cancer treatment.

Eagen said she didn’t think the McCarthy controversy would cause any long-term harm to the foundation, and would not characterize the choice of McCarthy as a “misstep.”

A press release the foundation issued Friday to announce the change did not acknowledge the criticism, and made only an oblique reference to the controversy, saying, “Since Tuesday’s announcement of the celebrity fitness instructor for the Bust a Move Ottawa, attention has shifted away from breast cancer awareness and fundraising.“

They do say they had to pay to get out of the contract. I hope they learned a lesson. This indeed WAS a misstep. I’m disappointed by this arrogant response.

It seems like she’s trying to back away from anti-vaccine stuff. A month ago she was the cover girl for one of the fitness magazines to which I subscribe, and in the interview she refused to talk about it. The most she said was that her son had great grades now except for reading. No one mentioned vaccines at all.